ILARSP: A grammatical profile of Irish

Abstract

Measures of profiling linguistic development have been valuable both for those dealing with language impairment and for research on normal acquisition. The value of profiling the acquisition of a minority language such as Irish is discussed, and the adaptation of LARSP to this Celtic language is detailed. This adaptation is based on longitudinal data from four children acquiring Irish as their mother-tongue. The problems of comprehensiveness and representativeness in adapting the profile to Irish are discussed, and the solutions arrived at are illustrated. Finally, it is recognized that there is a need to test this profile against further samples of children in order to develop age norms.

Key Words:

• Grammatical profiles
• ILARSP
• Irish acquisition